The Midwife of Platonism: Text and Subtext in Plato's Theaetetus

by David N. Sedley

The Theaetetus is among the most brilliant of Plato's dialogues, but is also deeply enigmatic, leaving readers divided over its philosophical intentions. David Sedley proposes and develops a solution, based on a groundbreaking two-level reading. Offering significant reinterpretations of the dialogue's main arguments, The Midwife of Platonism is addressed to all readers interested in Plato, and does not require knowledge of Greek.

212 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2004

Reviews

[I-kai · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are occasional brilliant observations, and Sedley's ease with Italian scholarship is enviable. But the driving thesis of this work, namely that Plato portrays the Socratic legacy with a view to its future denouement in Platonism runs into trouble at many places in the text and author is forced into ad hoc explanations. Thus Socrates' inability to solve the puzzle of false belief is a sign of the historical Socrates' lack of interest and competence in metaphysics, but the same Socrates' discussion of metaphysical implications of definitions of knowledge in other passages shows that he is aware of the need to go into such issues. The thesis feels Procrustean the further one reads on. In the end I'm not quite convinced!

[izabella · Rating 3 out of 5]

this was pretty good, i bought it as reading for an essay on midwifery in theaetetus and i wasnt disappointed by all sedley had to say about the topic. i will say i found it less excitig when he proceeded to reoutline the entire dialogue which was less relevant to my paper seeing as id already read it but i suppose someone will like theaetetus so much that that section will be interesting to them, unfortunately i am not that person. despite my 3 star rating though sedley clearly knows what hes talking about and for a proper philosophy book doesnt write like a twat so id say this pretty good as far as these types of things go. so overall 4 stars for he bits i needed for my essay 2 stars for all the boring bits so 3 stars overall